Add Svizra in Romansh, one of the four official languages.
and Confoederatio Helvetica, the official name that stands for the four other designations. (Whence CH as post code, and CHF used in banking for Swiss Francs)
(I like the Japanese name. We’re real squares !) 
In German, Milan is referred to as Mailand but much better is Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), which is something like Elfenbein Kuste (literally translated, “elephant bone coast”).
Also, for what it’s worth, Krungthep*, the capital of Thailand, is Bangkok to everyone outside of Thailand. I think Bangkok (or Bang Kok) is the original small village on the site. Bang = village, Kok = (I don’t know, but not what you’re thinking).
*The full name of the capital of Thailand is “Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Ayuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Piman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit”. Even in Thai this is a bit long to put on a t-shirt
That’s is a tortuous explanation.
Keys is from Spanish cayo(s) “shoal, islet”. Isn’t it what they are ?
The United States are called by the:
French Etats-Unis, abbreviated E.U.
Spanish *Estados Unidos * which they abbreviate EE.UU. (the double letters meaning plural)
German Vereinigte Staaten
Yugoslavs Zjdinjene Drzhave
Finns Yhdysvallat
Welsh Taleithiau Cyfenol or yr Unol Daleithian America
Gaels an t-Oilean-ur (New Iceland)
Arabs al-Wellat al-Motaheda
Chinese *Mei-kuo * (which is their pronunciation of “America”); given a Chinese
etymology the name would mean “beautiful country”; it is also called Mei zhou, in which mei “beautiful” has only a phonetical value for the accentuated syllable in America; *zhou * = continent. Japanese Beikoku is their pronunciation of the Chinese name ! Given a Japanese etymology, the name would mean “land of the rice” which is unapplicable since the Japan used to produce much more rice than the U.S.
Doesn’t pretty much every language have its own name for Geographic places? I can’t even think of one country we call by its indigenous name here and several city names have also been “translated” (e.g. Kiev into Kaenugardur, Kobenhavn into Kaupmannahofn*).
For the record, we usually call the USA “Bandaríkin” or just “Ameríka” but the “correct” term would be “Bandaríki Norður-Ameríku” (The United States of North-America), abbreviated as BNA. We often refer to New York as “Nyja Jorvik”, mostly because York was originally called Jorvik and while your language has changed, ours hasn’t.
France, Chile, Bolivia, Argentina, Ecuador, Congo, Viet Nam, Kyrgyzstan and many others.
To say nothing of England, Australia, Scotland, Canada, Jamaica, etc., of course.
Chicago, Massachusetts, …
There’s the Republic of the Congo [Brazzaville is the capital city] and there is the Democratic Republic of the Congo [Kinshasa is the capital city]. Both countries are Francophone but Brazza was colonized by the French and Kinshasa by the Belgians. Both have gone thru name changes - often linked to their colonial past.
Both go by Le Congo when you are incountry. A bit of trivia: Brazzaville and Kinshasa are facing each other - looking across the Congo River - and are the two closest capital cities in the world.
The Congo people [tribe] live in both countries.
It was easier to tell the countries apart way back when Mobutu created Zaire…based on the old portugese name for this area. Then he proceeded to ransack the country Congo/Kinshasa for any bit of wealth to put into his own pocket or to bribe any possible political opponent with a ministerial post. There’s alot more sad history to this country but this isn’t the right thread to rant and rave.
How else would they call their own country ? tell me.
Zimbabwe use to be called Rhodesia
I believe British Honduras is now Belize, but I always get those Central American countries jumbled up.
From a Florida tourism site:
That’s the explanation I’ve always heard. Makes more sense coming from a Spanish word than from French, since it was Spain that landed there first.
And in Malaysia, we refer to it as Amerika Syarikat. IMO, a more literal translation would be Negri-negri Bersekutu Amerika but the former is shorter and maybe that’s why it’s preferred over the latter.
In Danish:
Germany is Tyskland, where y is a tightened ‘oo’ sound. I guess from the ‘Teuton’ root. The German language is tysk.
France is Frankrig, =Franks kingdom (cognate to reich)
A lot of place names end with ien: Italien, Belgien, Californien, etc.
China=Kina, and Chinese is kinesisk. Not much of a ‘ch’ in Danish.
Other pronunciation quirks mean that Hawaii comes out as Hav-ay-ii, and Japan as Yapan, which is even further from Nippon than the English version.
In Malay:
France = Perancis (pronounced Per-run-cheese)
Netherlands = Belanda
Spain = Sepanyol
Egypt = we use its Arabic name, Mesir
Lebanon = Lubnan
Saudi Arabia = Arab Saudi
Japan = Jepun
USA = As mentioned in my post above, Amerika Syarikat
I think that’s it.
Correction… al-Wilâyât al-Muttahidah.
The Arabic name for the Ivory Coast is al-Sâhil al-‘Âjî, a literal translation of “the Ivory Coast.” How come Arabs and Germans can get away with translating the name into their language, but in English we’re forced to use the French version?
As for the 2 Congos, I can never get the names straight. I thought the one with Brazzaville was the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Then Laurent Kabila, changing the name back from Zaire, took the name Democratic Republic of the Congo to totally confound anyone’s attempts to tell the two countries apart. Should have left it Zaire. At least the name Zaire has flair and it wasn’t already taken.
(bolding mine)
?? Did you two happen to notice that UselessGit was posting from Iceland/Ijsland and was, therefore, refering to how those countries names appear in the language of that island country?
No - the question was not only about Icelandic:
To which the answer is ‘no’.
I posted in a thread once about Arabic names for Arab countries, and listed them all.
Most of the Arabic names are the same as in English or recognizably similar. In the case of Filastin, al-Urdun, and Suriyah the Arabic forms are derived from the same origin as the English forms, but developed differently. The vowel u in Suriyah reminds us that the Greek letter upsilon, which became y in English, was originally u. [symbol]Suria[/symbol] However, to avoid being consistent, which would make things distressingly easy to understand, the Greek upsilon in [symbol]Libua[/symbol] was converted to i in the Arabic name for Libya: Libiya.
By the way, the name of Libya written in Arabic script is one of the longest graphical palindromes in any language:
**
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\/ \/ \/ \/
.. . ..
**
I’ve never understood why the English form of Firenze is Florence – that seems a pretty big change. Ditto for the French calling London Londres.
I can understand changing Warszawa to Warsaw and Moskva to Moscow, but why Lebanon for Liban? Or Greece for Hellas? It’s not as if these names are difficult to pronounce. The Master has already addressed Germany/Deutschland.
and, IIRC, Egypt is something completely different to Egyptians.